... in the universe is constant- thus coining the First Law of Thermodynamics. Sir Charles Lyell (1797-1875) was educated at Oxford University, studied law and was admitted to the Bar. He soon changed tack, devoting his life to science and in particular the study of geology. It should be noted that he published the first two volumes of his Principles of Geology without having done any fieldwork, so not only was he self- taught, he was what we would call an 'arm-chair scientist'. He developed the theory of uniformitarianism which supplanted the catastrophism then prevalent among scientists. He is considered one of the founders of the discipline of stratigraphy, the study of the layers of the Earth's surface and gave us the names Eocene, Miocene and Pliocene for three of these. William John Macquorn Rankine (1820-1872) was a civil engineer by profession. He had studied at Edinburgh University and after his apprenticeship he made important contributions to the science of railway locomotion, became professor of civil engineering and mechanics at Glasgow in 1855 and later became president of the Scottish ...

... persistently over very long periods of time. Also, it became accepted, largely because of the work of Louis Agassiz (1807-1873), a Swiss naturalist and catastrophist, who moved to the United States in 1846, that the erratic boulders and drift deposits had been carried by glaciers during an 'Ice Age', not by tidal waves [15, 18, 21. The concept of Ice Ages became a part of the uniformitarian consensus, on the assumption that the environmental changes associated with them occurred in a gradual fashion. Lyell's uniformitarianism, which was gradualism by another name, ruled without serious challenge for a century or more [9, 15, 18. 20th Century Catastrophists Possible catastrophist scenarios, often speculative in nature, continued to be put forward, to little effect. Hugh Auchincloss Brown (1879-1975), an engineer who graduated from Columbia University, proposed in a 1948 private publication that the tilt of the Earth's axis could change in catastrophic fashion, the disturbances being triggered by the weight of polar ice. Ten years later, Charles Hapgood, a ...

... to put a fact without some leaven of a lie." --Lord George Byron, Don Juan (1) Anything but history, for history must be false. --Sir Robert Walpole, Walpoliana (2) It has been said that "history is the lie agreed upon" and that "the victors write history." This is especially true with respect to the doctrine of uniformity, promulgated in the last century by James Hutton and Charles Lyell. With the acceptance of their doctrine came a historical revision in science --from catastrophism to uniformitarianism --that directed research along gradualist paths which admitted no major violent breaks in the geological record. The concept, in 1950, was so deeply entrenched that, when Immanuel Velikovsky offered his catastrophic theory in Worlds in Collision it was met with a belligerent outcry of passion. What Velikovsky had revived was the old debate which, in establishment uniformitarian circles, was regarded as settled for all time. Every piece of evidence presented by Velikovsky in Earth in Upheaval to support his concept was explained away by his uniformitarian opponents as they invoked ad ...

... matter to the scientists, but the assertion that Marxism was behind the British Museum of Natural History's exhibitions was an invitation to comment. Dr Halstead was given a chance to repeat his views, and a Museum curator was allowed to explain the scientific nature of the exhibitions. The interviewer was not sympathetic to Dr Halstead, and ended up trying to corner him into the accusation of political subversion by the Museum. It was pointed out to us by Mr Shannon that Dr George Grinnell had stated that political considerations are at the heart of uniformitarianism (see PENSEE IVR I, p. 43; X, p. 47): this is as true now as ever. Readers well versed in History will doubtless know this fact also: Marx was a great enthusiast of the Darwinian theories, and he even tried to dedicate a book to Darwin. Darwin, for his part having no relish for Marx's theories, firmly refused the dedication. THE EVOLUTION DEBATE As Mr H. Tresman, SIS Chairman, noted at the recent AGM in London, the BBC 2 television ...

... much an amateur at this stage, he had been introduced to speculations about evolution by the writings of his grandfather, Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802), who had views similar to those of Lamarck, and by Robert Grant, while he was a medical student at Edinburgh. Then later, at Cambridge, he had learned much from his friendship with the botanist, J. S. Henslow. On the long years of the Beagle voyage he read avidly the Principles of Geology by Charles Lyell, who had developed James Hutton's ideas of uniformitarianism and slow changes over very long periods of time. Darwin was particularly excited by the second volume, which describes mutual wars of the different groups of animals and plants in their struggle for food and survival. This point was reinforced on his return from the voyage when, in 1838, he read Thomas Malthus on population [18. The Origins of Natural Selection By this time it is likely that Darwin had more or less formulated his ideas on evolution by natural selection, but his main priority was in establishing scientific respectability with ...

... was sent to us: there is an extended Monitor-type column with reviews of scientific literature by Ian Johnson, and two stimulating pieces by Irving Wolfe on the assimilation (without credit given), of Velikovsky's ideas and on Cultural Amnesia. Secretary: Frank Wallace, R.R. #1, Minder, Ontario, Canada K0M 2K0. Dante's Inferno? source: New Scientist 10.12.81, p. 762 John Hillaby, the New Scientist roving writer, reported a visit to the tar pits of Rancho La Brea with a curious mixture of accepted uniformitarianism and almost poetic catastrophic awareness. The pools of sticky asphalt at La Brea were supposedly formed 35,000 years ago by oil rising to the surface through sedimentary deposits from the Santa Monica mountains. Hillaby mentions their present day catch of a few ground squirrels, bats and birds as a background to the accepted explanation of the enormous numbers and variety of remains of large, extinct animals found in them. These are supposed to have accidentally stumbled in, fleeing from predators or attacking beasts already caught. Is it possible, though ...

... . A. Prikhod'ko (O. Yu. Shmidt Institute of Earth Physics, Moscow State University): Astron. Zh. 66, (Jan.- Feb. 1989), pp. 120-125 translated into English in Soviet Astronomy 33:1 (Jan.- Feb. 1989), pp. 64-67, is of great interest and merit. As is well known, all evolution proceeds both by gradual change and by sudden change whose groundwork is laid by the gradual change; which fact underlies the schools of thought termed uniformitarianism and catastrophism. These ideologies tend not toward mere specialisation but rather toward antagonistic exclusiveness (which I do not favour). The Soviet scientists' analysis of the Venus data including reduction to useful parameters assumes the uniformitarian aspect of the evolution of Venus. That is excellent and necessary. I am interested also in the possible catastrophist aspect, which appears not to be ruled out by the data as such. Stimulated by the perhaps completely wrong, surely at least partly wrong, but perhaps partly and essentially correct theories of Clube, ...